Gestational Diabetes

Our little guy in early July.

This pregnancy has been by far the hardest of all my pregnancies. I guess it's to be expected. Having 6 kids in 8 1/2 years does a number on your body and with Dan and this new baby so close, I didn't have much time off for my body to recover. I'm also getting older and with being 31 I'm starting to cross into the age where pregnancy has higher risks. That's really weird because I'm still young, but I guess my body's not as young as me. :) Anyway, at one of my appointments in June the doctor commented that I've been consistently measuring about 2 weeks bigger than I should be and she wanted me to have an ultrasound to see if they could find the reason why. Of course I was excited about this, if there was even a chance this baby was due a few weeks earlier it would totally make my day. Well, that's not what was determined. Instead they discovered the baby was a little bigger, but mostly I just had a lot of fluid.

Excess fluid and bigger babies are signs of Gestational Diabetes. The doctor had me take another 3 hour glucose test (this was my second one this pregnancy) and though my glucose levels got better as the test went on, the first poke (after fasting) was way too high. It was determined that I likely did have the diabetes and that was the reason for so many issues I was having. I was sent to a nutritionist who talked with me about gestational diabetes, taught me my new diet of limited carbs, and sent me home with my own finger poker (as my kids call it) with instructions to take my blood glucose levels 4 times a day. Fun! I know! I absolutely love carbs and this was not something I was looking forward to. Not only that, but I was surprised with all the foods that had carbs. I knew to stay away from bread and grains, but I didn't know about all the carbs in fruit, milk, other foods. Basically, I've been limited to meat and cheese with a few snacks on carbs here and there.


It took me about a week to level out my glucose levels, but as the doctor told me I did started feeling a little better. I was still hugely pregnant and due to the fact that I had the diabetes I was larger than average and therefore more uncomfortable, so I still had that to deal with, but watching my diet did make me feel better. My headaches started going away, I was less dizzy and I didn't loose my breathe nearly as much as I did before. All good things, especially when you're in charge of 5 little kids. So, that's the fun thing I get to deal with during this pregnancy. I have to watch my food intake in order to keep this babies weight down and my own weight down. Once the baby gets here the diabetes will go away and I won't have to watch my carbs anymore (maybe I will a little to try and loose weight.)


As far as the rest of the pregnancy goes, we're all really ready for our little guy to get here. I'm ready to sleep in my own bed (I have to sleep on the couch in order to be comfortable enough for sleep) I'm ready to be able to bend over and pick up my kids toys again. I'm ready to stop the false contractions and to just simply have my body back to myself. I know it'll be hard adding another little baby to our family, but I really believe it'll be easier than being pregnant with him has been. I keep telling myself I need to try and enjoy this pregnancy, take it all in. It's the last one and I'll never have this experience again. I've found that's a lot easier said than done. I do enjoy grabbing his little foot through my belly and feeling that unreal sensation that there is a human being growing inside me, but that's where my like of the pregnancy ends. I think I'll always remember what it's like to be pregnant, I just don't enjoy it anymore.


The kids are ready to have mom back as well. I've been real grumpy and they've had to do a lot more than normal so I know they're ready to have mommy back. They're also very excited to meet their new baby brother. Most mornings Hannah comes upstairs, lifts up my shirt to see my belly and goes "GRRRR! Mommy the baby is suppose to come out now." I just laugh in agreement. She's right! He is suppose to come out now, but I keep telling myself he will come out when he's ready and that he's growing now and is where he needs to be. So we'll see. I can't wait to meet him, can't wait to have him out of me and can't wait to move on with life.

AHHHHHH!

Just a cute picture of my happy baby.

Dan has become very fun the past little while. As I said in his birthday blog he has developed quite the personality. One of the things I like most about him are the noises he makes. After having Hannah who is speech delayed and never did do the normal baby sounds and then having Gracie follow her so quickly and pick up a lot of Hannah's speech, it's been awhile since we've had a baby make actual baby noises. Dan does the typical 'ma, ma da, da' sound most 1 year olds do, but his favorite sound is to 'AHHHHHH!' It's very cute. If you get him to look at you, you can almost always get him to yell for you. Here's some pictures of him doing just that for the camera.

Man I love this little guy.

Preston Rodeo Parade

Watching the parade.

The last weekend in July we headed down to my in-laws house. Kenny had some work appointments in both Grace and Preston so we decided that the kids and I would join him. We headed to Grace first and the kids played at the elementary school playground while Kenny did his first appointment. After that we made a quick stop at my in-laws to say hi to grandma before we headed to Preston for another appointment.

Ben and Hannah 'resting' before the parade.

Gracie and Sarah 'resting' before the parade.

This weekend also happened to be the same weekend as the famous Preston Night Rodeo. I grew up going to this rodeo every year and it was always a huge event in my family. Many of my fondest memories as a child are from this yearly event. It was kind of weird being back in Preston with my kids during the rodeo. I long for those good old days and for my kids to have the same experienced I had as a child. It definitely wasn't the same. I don't really have many family members in that area and there is definitely not a big family get together like there was when I was young.

Dan waiting for the parade and entertaining himself the the strollers buckle.

Instead of a big family get together, the kids and I went to Arctic Circle to have some ice cream and wait for Daddy. When he was done at his appointment we decided to stay for the parade. As a kid I always loved the parades during rodeo. They throw out soooo much candy and for a kid it's pure heaven. We were excited for the kids to get to see the parade and just enjoy one of the great things about summer. Much to our surprise this Friday night parade was an all horse parade. It was something new they were trying out this year and I must say it was a huge disappointed. The kids did get some candy, but very little, and in my opinion there are only so many horse you can look at walking down the street before you get bored. Oh well! Such as life. The kids enjoyed themselves, as best they could, and they even got to watch the parade with some friends of theirs who just happened to be in the same area as us. Overall, definitely not the best parade I've ever seen, but I'm glad we went anyway.

Waving at the horse and people as they passed by.

Getting some of the little candy that was thrown.

Blue Angel's

The Blue Angels

The weekend of the 24th of July was a big weekend here in Idaho Falls. If you're from this area you know the 24th of July is when Utah and most Mormons celebrate the arrival of the Saints in the Salt Lake Valley. I grew up with it being a huge holiday with parades and fairs and things, but in Idaho they don't typically celebrate like they do in Utah. Actually, the 24th was a big weekend for another reason. The Blue Angels were in town to do an air show and the sky's were filled with all kinds of planes doing amazing tricks.

Getting stickers from the flight crew.

I've always wanted to go to an air show, but have never had the opportunity. We decided that even though we would probably all really enjoy the air show, it just wasn't a good idea for us this year. It was kind of pricey (especially with 5 kids) and being the end of July the weather would likely be quite hot. We were a little disappointed, but it wasn't a huge deal. Then Thursday afternoon we heard the planes in the sky to our west. I got a text from a friend saying the Blue Angels were practicing down at the airport and it was a great show. So, feeling this was quite possibly a once in a life time chance, we got the kids up from naps and headed to the airport.

4 of the planes taking off.

The kids watching the show.

We didn't know where we were going, but found a nice spot outside a parking lot to watch the two planes currently in the air, do some tricks. When they were done we saw a bunch of cars leaving an alleyway. We walked over and discovered the runway and a few dozen people waiting to see what was next. We loaded the kids in the car and went to join them. We found out they were doing a run through of the actual show in about an hour so of course we had to stay. While waiting the flight crew stopped by and passed out stickers to all the kids and talked to a few of the adults. It was a cool thing for the kids.

These planes flew amazingly close.

Making cool smoke trails in the sky.

The show itself was extremely impressive. When it started, it definitely didn't disappoint. We were right in front of the runway so we got to see the planes take off and land. The way those planes fly is just amazing. They started out in 2 groups. One group was 4 planes who flew very close to each other and did amazing tricks in the air. The other group was the remaining 2 planes who often flew straight for each other and then maneuvered away at the last minute. They were loud, which the kids didn't like at first, but they were so impressive. I can't even imagine doing anything like what those pilots do. WOW!!! If you ever get a chance to go to one of their air shows, I highly recommend it.

The two planes working together. The fence is in the way, but you can see one is upside down and the other is not. They too were extremely close to each other.

All 6 planes with their support plane 'Fat Albert' on the ground.

The next morning we heard the pilots were downtown meeting people. We loaded the kids in the car and drove down only to find out we missed them by about 10 minutes. Oh well! We went back to the airport that afternoon to watch them practice again and enjoyed watching their amazing tricks one more time.

Making more cool designs out of smoke.

So, we weren't able to go to the actual air show, which I'm sure was really cool, but we did get to see some amazing things. Honestly, I can't help wonder if our seats the two previous days were better than the actual air show. I heard it was a mess down there on Saturday because of all the people and I know it was a very, very hot day. None of us would have liked sitting in the heat waiting for the air show. Our way of doing it turned out wonderfully and everyone enjoyed the show.

July In A Nutshell

July was another busy month. Summer seems to be that way. As I look back it doesn't seem like we did much, but it doesn't seem like we stopped doing things either. The first event in July the 4th of July. We decided to stay home this year for the 4th (it goes along with my holidays at home theme for the year.) My family was unable to come, but last minute my in-laws decided to come up for the fireworks. It was a very quick trip up for them, but we were happy to see them. We've heard a lot of good things about the Idaho Falls 4th of July fireworks and were excited to check them out. We looked online to find out where the best place to see them was and decided to go down by the snake river about 4:00 to get a good area on the grass. The whole family walked to a great spot by the river. Kenny went back to the car to get the chairs and stuff while I watched the kids. Of course within the first 5 minutes, Gracie went head first into the river. Poor kid! It was a very shallow area where the water wasn't moving fast so I didn't have to worry about that, but I was helping Dan and wasn't there to catch her when she toppled over. She was drenched from head to toe and not happy. Frankly neither was I because I had told the kids repeatedly to stay away from the river and they wouldn't. Oh well! She learned a lesson and I took her back to the car to change. I also took Hannah and Dan with me to the house to get a few things we had forgotten to pack. We went to the grocery store and got lunchables for dinner and some snack items and then headed back to out great spot. Ben, Sarah, and Daddy had set up our area, done some walking around and just enjoyed their time as big kids with Daddy. After that we waited for the fireworks to start. My in-laws came about 8:00 and the kids played card games with them and we took them for walks to pass the time. Around 10:00 the fireworks started and much to our surprise our great spot was, well, not so great. I don't know if they moved the fireworks this year (that was kind of our guess considering how many people swore it was a great spot and were completely caught off guard by the actual location of the firework) or if we and/or the Internet was just way off. Anyway, they were in a totally different spot than we thought. We had a few great big trees in front of us. Kind of disappointing, but from what we could see, the fireworks were really good. We look forward to trying again next year and actually seeing all of them. My in-laws spent the night and went to church with us the next day. We walked down by the river after church and enjoyed spending some time with them.

Other than the 4th of July we didn't have many things happen during July. The kids have really enjoyed the summer and being outside. They ride their bikes all the time and love to come in for Popsicles when it's too hot. We set up their swimming pool and they swim and play in the water for hours at a time. It's been a very unstructured summer which has been nice in some ways, but not in others. I'm looking forward to next summer when we have more income and less of a pregnant Mom. It'll be nice to be able to do things.

Sadly that's about all we did in July. We stayed home and played and just lived life. Kenny worked a lot which was hard for the family, but was necessary. We miss him when he's busy or not here, but I'm very proud of all that he's doing. There were a few other things done in July that I'm going to blog about, but for the most part nothing substantial happened. I guess that makes it easy to blog about, right. :)

Dan the Man's First Year

I can't believe my little man is 1. This year seemed to have gone by so fast. Honestly, it's been hard being pregnant through most of Dan's first year of life. I feel like I've missed out on a lot, but as Kenny said, he's too small to know so it's OK. Dan is a wonderful little boy and it's been fun watching him become a little person. Because of all his dark hair, he has always looked older than he is, but now he's quickly leaving the baby stage and entering the toddler stage. He's starting to look more his age. As I said, Dan is a wonderful kid and I just love who he's becoming. He's always been our most serious one who doesn't smile as a rule. He's a very happy kid, but he saves smiles for when someone is entertaining him or he has a reason to smile. Lately this has been more and more often. The older he gets the more 'boy' he becomes. He loves to be thrown on the couch or up in the air. Sarah Kate's favorite game to play with him is to run at him yelling. When she gets close he dives into me for safety, laughing the entire time. He's very playful and I've really enjoyed watching him play with his siblings. He loves to chase after them and have them chase him. That's one of the best things about being a parent, watching your kids play together.

My purple little dude just after he was born. Man was his birth scary.

Mommy and Dan just after delivery.

Ready to leave the hospital with his blue monkey.

Dan's physical skills have always seemed a little slow, but he is doing much better and is getting closer to what the others were doing at his age. He's still not walking yet (as of 13 1/2 months) but as I remember, none of our kids were walking by now. He's standing a little on his own, only when we make him, and walks around the furniture like a pro. He'll get there, hopefully he'll bet Sarah Kate's 18 months. He loves to clap, make noises with his mouth, he recently learned to give high 5's and loves this new skill. His favorite place to play is in the kitchen drawer with bowls and cups in it. He throws them on the floor and knows which ones make the most noise. Those are his favorites. He's a great crawler and has gotten very fast the past few months.

One week old. Nice face dude.

Annual pictures. Almost 2 weeks old.

At the zoo in Salt Lake. 2 months old.

As far as brains go he seems to be pretty smart. I know, all parents think this of their kids, but he does things non of the others did. There's no being sneaky with Daniel. When you hide a toy, or say the remote control, most babies of Dan's age think it's gone. This is typical, it's something they taught me in college. However, Dan has never been fooled by the hide the toy game. Even if he doesn't see where you put it, he'll look for it and almost always find it. Pretty smart for a one year old and pretty inconvenient for his parents. He's always been very good at finding us as well. From the moment he could crawl he could find us even if he had no sign of where we were. I guess this means he'll be one of the few males in the world with good directions.

Mister drooler.

October '09 4 months old

6 month birthday, sitting up like a big boy.

That's my little dude in a nutshell. I know there's things I've left out, but for now that'll have to do. Oh funny thing about little dude. I'm not completely sure Daniel knows his name is Dan. Ben is our Buddy and Dan is our Dude. These are the nicknames they have and Ben knows not to answer to Dude (unless mom's having one of her forgetful moments.) Dan on the other hand, doesn't respond to his name. If you call out dude (or dude-a-ling or dude-sicle, I know we're weird) he turns and looks every time. I guess we'll have to work on the name thing.

His 6 month picture (taken a little late. 10 months old)

Our happy 1 year old.

Dan's Cake

I've always made the same cake for my kids first birthday. It's a little teddy bear that I made for Sarah Kate and I thought would be a good tradition for all of them. After all these years and all the cakes I've made I'm starting to get the hang of how to get them out of the pan. Luckily this cake wasn't too hard to make and the decorating was easy. It turned out pretty good (minus the help Gracie gave to the right foot) and Dan even learned to like it which was important. The blue heart was Ben's idea. He didn't want Dan's cake to have a pink or red heart because Dan's a boy. Very logical thought process if you ask me. This blogs told in pictures so enjoy.

Presenting Dan his cake. He didn't know what to think.

Good thing he has big sisters to help him blow out his candle.

And another big sister to show him how to eat the cake.

It took Dan awhile to warm up to the idea of eating his cake. He was teething and not in the best of moods. He did however, get happier as the cake eating went on.

He got messier as the cake eating went on as well.

Then he decided to share with Gracie. (I love this picture.)

At last it was time for a bath. Good cake eating experience if you ask me.

Happy Birthday Dan

Dan turned 1 on June 23rd. The year has just flown by and I can't believe how big he's gotten. His birthday was in the middle of a crazy time in our life and we weren't able to celebrate it on the big day. We were still trying to get the wave runner out of our old garage, the car had some electrical issues that we had to attend to and that made it so we couldn't go downtown for a gift, I was exhausted from the move and we had the reunion coming up. That was only the beginning of our lateness with his party. We didn't actually have a party for Dan until July. Good thing he's only one and doesn't understand. It was a very small party, but we enjoyed it anyway.

Sarah Kate bringing Dan upstairs for his party.

We got Dan a pool for his birthday. He loves to be outside and loves the water.

The Move

The kids sitting outside our new house.

June was our super busy, super crazy, super stressful month. Most of this was because of our move. The people who own our old house want to sell it and they wanted us out of it while they try (why, in this market if you have renters you want to kick them out and try and sell an empty house I'll never know, but that's their choice.) This put stress on us. First they wanted us out in March to try and take advantage of the tax credit for first time home buyers that ended in April, but luckily it was determined, thanks to our lease, that we did get to stay through May. As May approached we still didn't have a place to live. Financially we're doing much better than we have been, but the new job we have was just starting to take off and we couldn't afford to move. We kept putting it aside not knowing what to do. I kept praying for some kind of guidance and all I got was to be patient. I hate that answer (I seem to be getting it a lot, maybe it's something I need to work on.) So we waited. We discussed all our options from bad to worse to anything else we could think of but no decisions were made.

Then in early May one of Sarah Kate's friends, Jenna, came over to play. Her dad had gotten a job in Washington state back in November and he had been living there ever since. Jenna, her mom, and 2 siblings had stayed in Idaho to finish the school year and try to sell their house. Now that the school year was coming to a close I asked Jenna what their plans were. She said her parents said their house was never going to sell so they were just going to move to Washington anyway. That's when the idea hit me. I told Kenny he should approach them about renting their house, it was worth a shot right! They thought it was a wonderful idea. Originally the house was going to stay on the market and we'd just show it when someone wanted to see it, but they decided to take it off the market (thanks to the horrible house market we're in) and have us sign a year lease. It was perfect. The answer to my prayer had finally come and our patience had payed off.

There was only one problem. Our new home wasn't suppose to be vacant until the middle of June and we had to be out of our other house the end of May. Not wanting to box everything we own, put it in a storage unit, and live homeless for 2 weeks, we got the number for the people who own our house to see if we could stay in it for 2 extra weeks. Annoyingly they would never answer our phone calls or call us back. We were very worried and getting really bugged. We talked to our landlords (they happen to be our neighbors and are different from the people who own the house) and found out that the owners had recently changed their cell phone numbers. We had been calling their old numbers for over a week. No wonder they didn't answer or return any of our messages. We got their new numbers, they agreed to let us stay, and we were set for our future. What a relief. Now all that was in store for us was finding a way to pay for a move and making the actual move. Sometimes being an adult is not that much fun.

Coming to see the picture Mommy took.

So the time came in the middle of June for the move. We actually moved just a few houses away which I thought would make for an easy move, but didn't really. When people normally move they box up their belongings for weeks before the big day. We didn't do this and it made the actual move seem to take longer. The people in our new house ended up getting out a day and a half early and so we had 4 and a half days to move. We went a little long, but luckily the owners of our old house were very understanding and in no real hurry to have us out. We started the move the night of June 14th, spent our first night in the new house the next night, and were finally done with everything very late on June 24. It was crazy, but I'm glad it's done.

As far as the move itself goes, it was exhausting. As I look back on it I honestly don't know how we managed. Kenny was trying to still work the week of the move which didn't leave much time for the move. I was surprised at the limits the pregnancy put on my ability to do things. I'm the type of person who likes to dive in and do things myself, I hate asking for help, but I quickly learned there was a lot I simply couldn't do. I still did more than I probably should have, but I wasn't able to do all I wanted to. Luckily we're surrounded by wonderful people who came to our rescue. My mother-in-law came up for a day to help us move, she did a lot of cleaning of the old house and it was very appreciated. Being in a new ward I didn't know the new relief society president, but when she heard of our move she jumped at the chance to help us. On Friday we had half a dozen or more women, most of whom I had never met, cleaning our old house. This was such welcome help because by that time I was so dead I didn't know how I was going to get that house clean. They finished the entire house in a few hours. I don't know what I would have done without them.

The view of our old house from our front yard. Our old house is the second house from the corner.

We were pretty much cleaned out of the house on Friday the 18th (this was the day we were suppose to be out) but we did have a few other things left over to move. The garage still had some things in it, mainly the wave runner. Annoyingly, the wheel on the wave runner had broken and we couldn't find a replacement part. No place in Idaho Falls sold the size of piece we needed so we didn't know how we were going to get it out of the garage. We were allowed to keep the wave runner in the garage for another week until we could figure out how to move it. After trying to find the right part, Kenny finally figured out how to make the old piece work enough to get it moved to our new house. So the night of the 24th we spent a few hours getting the wave runner working and out of the garage. It was a relief to have it done and over to our new house. We left for Kenny's family reunion the next morning and it was nice to know the move was over.

As far as the new house goes, we absolutely love it. It's a lot like our old house, but slightly bigger with a much better layout for our family. We put Ben and Sarah downstairs in the big bedroom and ended up putting Gracie and Hannah downstairs as well. I was a little unsure about this at first, but the little girls seem to love it and there has been no problems thus far. This allowed us to move the office upstairs which has been wonderful and has made the room a lot easier to use. Considering a lot of the work we do is from home, an office is important. Daniel currently has his own room, but that'll change when his little brother arrives. Kenny's sister Karen got new furniture for her sitting room and they donated their old couch and love seat to us. It was a welcome addition and has really helped make our house a home. We moved our old couch, which we hated, downstairs in the playroom for the kids, and left the couch and love seat upstairs. Without them our bigger family room would have looked really bare. Thanks Karen and Cory.

Hannah looking at a horse in our back yard.

What we get too see when we look out our back windows!

What else is there to love about our new house? The yard is significantly smaller than our old yard, but it backs up to a pasture instead of someone else's yard and house. I didn't realize how much I would love the view of horses out my back window. Now we see at least a dozen horse, 2 cows, hills in the distance and lots of windmills on the hills. It's so peaceful and I've decided my dream property would back up to nothing but pastures and views of mountains. I absolutely love it and the kids have really enjoyed the horses in the backyard. You can literally see our old house from our front yard and the kids have gotten a kick out of this. I love the location of our new house. It's right at the T in our neighborhood so the cars are all going slow to make the turn. I don't worry about the kids riding bikes at this house like I did at the other one. Also, their friends are closer and I can generally see where they're playing. It has made a huge impact not being so isolated on the road leading into the neighborhood. The kids have loved summer and being able to see whose outside to play with. Overall, it was a good move and I'm so grateful we were able to make it. If all goes well I can see us being very happy here for years to come. Sometimes I look at my life, stress and all, and I'm just amazed at how lucky I truly am.

Boise Reunion Day 2

My kids the owls.

Saturday was swim day at the Boise reunion. Most of the family headed over to Roaring Springs Water Park for a fun day in the sun and water. Due to the fact that it would have cost us an arm and a leg to take our family of 7 and we wouldn't have been able to do much (having a 1 year old and a pregnant Mommy) we decided to decline on the swimming day and do our own little thing with just our family and Grandma and Grandpa.

Gracie smelling flowers at the MK Nature Center.

We took our time getting ready in the morning, which was a nice change from the way our life had been going thanks to our recent move. I bathed all the kids, took a shower myself, and Kenny did some work before getting ready himself. Around noon we headed out for our day of fun. We met Grandma and Grandpa at McDonald's for lunch and then headed over to the old train depot. If you ever go to Boise this is a must see. The grounds of the depot are beautiful and the kids had a great time climbing rocks, feeding the fish, and running around on the grass. We walked over and saw the old train that's on display and then headed back to the car. There was a wedding reception going on so we couldn't go in the depot itself. No problem, it just leaves us something to do next time we're in town.

Climbing in the rocks at the train depot.

Feeding the fish 'Goldfish Crackers.'

Sarah Kate smelling a flower and really wanting her picture taken.

This is my attempt to get a picture of all my kids in front of the train. They were far to interested in looking at the train to turn for a picture.

After the train depot we headed over to the MK Nature Center. It's a nice little building with some interactive kid things and then a nature walk outside. It's a very pleasant place and the kids loved exploring the flowers, fish, and other things it had to offer. It was hot out and so after the nature walk we headed to Cabela's to see their fish and displays in a nice air conditioned building. When we were done there we thought ice cream was fitting so we went to Wendy's for some frosty's. It was a great day out and best of all, minus the frosty's, it was free.

Playing in the sand in the nature center.

Gracie in the flowers.

Dan loved the fish.

The kids dipping their feet in the stream. It felt good after our hot day in the sun.

The rest of the day was back with the family. We headed over to a Mexican restaurant for dinner with the entire Holderness family. Again it was nice to see everyone and do some visiting. After dinner we took the very tired kids back to Becky and Dave's for bed. They were staying home so we left our sleeping kids with them and headed over to Uncle Darin's house for some ice cream. It was a great way to end the reunion. We're excited for next year and the next reunion.